Judge Emmett's vision

It's time to embrace cohesive regional planning, perhaps consolidation in some areas.

Copyright 2014: Houston Chronicle

Updated 6:21 pm, Tuesday, March 4, 2014

Photo: Melissa Phillip, Staff

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Harris County Judge Ed Emmett speaks during the Greater Houston Partnership State of the County Address held at the Hilton Americas, 1600 Lamar Street, Thursday, Feb. 27, 2014, in Houston. ( Melissa Phillip / Houston Chronicle ) less

Harris County Judge Ed Emmett speaks during the Greater Houston Partnership State of the County Address held at the Hilton Americas, 1600 Lamar Street, Thursday, Feb. 27, 2014, in Houston. ( Melissa Phillip / ... more

Photo: Melissa Phillip, Staff

Judge Emmett's vision

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Show us a political candidate and we'll show you someone who drones on about the problem of waste and corruption in government. Show us an elected official who does something about it and - well - we'll drop our jaw. Few of them act on any of the rhetoric, which calls for making government more efficient.

Why?

They are deathly scared of upsetting fiefdoms that have become inefficient, entrenched and bloated. So imagine our surprise - make that joy - when Harris County Judge Ed Emmett posed a series of prescient questions geared to make regional governing entities think about ways to operate more efficiently. There is no such thing as a new idea and Emmett's questions, asked during his annual State of the County speech, have been aired before. But other regions in the United States have consolidated effectively, and we believe it should be considered here.

Emmett said civic leaders have been troubled by the lack of a cohesive regional governing framework since, at least, the 1950s. The situation is much worse today. There are now about 1,000 governmental entities in Harris County and its adjacent counties. In that area are about 120 municipalities with populations from a few hundred to Houston's 2.2 million. There are more than 150 local law enforcement agencies, about 40 school districts, hundreds of municipal utility districts, nearly 100 fire departments, three port authorities, scores of specialty districts, hospital districts, health departments, tax increment reinvestment zones, management districts and, of course, thousands of homeowners associations.

The only thing we have that even vaguely passes for a regional governing structure is the Houston-Galveston Area Council (HGAC). HGAC is one of two dozen regional councils of governments (better known as COGS) throughout the state that act as a forum for regional cooperation. HGAC does provide some regional perspective on certain issues, especially in how highway and road construction money will be allocated throughout the region. But for the most part, participation by the constituent governmental entities is voluntary and there are many areas, such as law enforcement, where it plays only a minor role.

Also, as Emmett pointed out, the city of Houston's annexation policy or perhaps more accurately, its lack of an annexation policy, has greatly exacerbated the regional governance conundrum. For many years, Houston extended spindly "finger annexations" from its borders or cut special limited-annexation deals with the surrounding areas for a cut of the sales tax. The purpose of these annexations was two-fold. They allowed the city to cherry pick high sales-tax-generating retail properties without having to provide surrounding areas with any city services. They also blocked other cities from annexing the areas or the citizens of those areas from incorporating their own municipality.

But this policy has left vast swaths of Harris County with no municipal government. Currently there are about 1.6 million people living in Harris County in an unincorporated area. If that area were a city, it would be the second-largest city in Texas after Houston. It also is the fastest-growing area of the county and likely to surpass Houston's population by the next census.

With property taxes churning ever higher and infrastructure being stretched to the breaking point, it is past time to take a serious stab at answering the questions Emmett poses. Any attempt to bring some kind of regional rationality to our governing structures will be like climbing Mt. Everest.

Few elected officials will even talk about the subject. That's why we applaud Emmett for, at least, starting the conversation. Now let's see if others have the vision and the political courage to follow his lead.